At 03:54 PM 1/26/2007 -0500, Ed Leafe wrote: > > Seriously, am I coming across as a jerk? > > No, not at all. It just addresses your statement that belief is all >that is necessary, and that acts don't matter.
Ah. Well, at the risk of confusing things again, I'd like to clarify my views of "acts" of a believer. I believe the Bible teaches that faith in Jesus is all that is required for salvation. However, once a person is saved, doing "good" should occur. Maybe the person was doing "good" before they became saved, maybe not. The thing is, if someone claims to be a Christian but continuously commits evil acts, there is good reason to doubt they are saved. The book of James in the New Testament can be sort of summed up by the phrase "Faith without works is a dead faith." Guarding one's behavior as a Christian serves at least 2 purposes: 1) to show others the grace God has given you, and 2) to help you evaluate your relationship with God. If a self-proclaimed Christian has absolutely no desire to do good acts in the name of God, it would be advisable for that person to re-examine their heart and find out what is wrong. So I hope I didn't derail things. To obtain salvation, works are meaningless. But once salvation is obtained, works are important. Not to "hold on to" your salvation, but in the very least for the reasons I cite above. -Charlie _______________________________________________ Post Messages to: [email protected] Subscription Maintenance: http://leafe.com/mailman/listinfo/profox OT-free version of this list: http://leafe.com/mailman/listinfo/profoxtech ** All postings, unless explicitly stated otherwise, are the opinions of the author, and do not constitute legal or medical advice. This statement is added to the messages for those lawyers who are too stupid to see the obvious.
